BLOG

This Week in Tech - 11/8/15

# ICYMI

The tech news even your aunt in the midwest is up on.

Payments startup Square filed SEC paperwork this week that indicates the company is seeking to make an initial public offering at $11 to $13 a share, which comes out to roughly a $4 billion valuation. That’s about a third less than the $6 billion valuation at which Square raised its last round of financing a year ago - a fact that absolutely no publication has failed to notice. The Wall Street Journal called it “a reality check” and Re/Code cawed that Square was “take[ing] an IPO Bullet for All of the Overpriced Unicorns.”

# This Week in Bubbles

When the Final Judgment comes, can I have your loft?

The world is probably not ending any time soon. At least not if you ask Sam Altman, the YCombinator guru who says it's less of a bubble, more of a bust. Altman’s Startup Playbook also launched, #1 on Product Hunt Books for Thursday, so it's not like he's got a whole career riding on the bubble question or anything. VC blogger Fred Wilson, meanwhile, cryptically speculates that “the amplitude of the mania is inversely correlated to its duration.”

# This Week in GAFA

Fabernovel released its annual report this week.

GAFAnomics Season 2: 4 Superpowers to Outperform in the Network Economy presents the firm’s analysis of the new economy through the lens of the companies that have conquered it: Google, Apple, Facebook, and Amazon (GAFA); and those that have skyrocketed to success on the infrastructure GAFA built, including Netflix, Airbnb, and Uber. To celebrate the report, this week we’re checking in on what each of the Fab Four is up to: